Domaine Anita Beaujolais

Sacre bleu, the only thing missing from that list is the kitchen sink.

That said, I'm surprised that industrial wineries haven't tried to cash in on the natural craze by developing natty wine additives. What can be more appealing than making natty wines in a controlled setting, with a constant level of every flaw across every vintage? Recent converts will be thrilled.
 
I remember really liking an aphorism I heard that said beer brewing appealed to engineers and wine making to the artists.

It looks like the wine industry has adopted engineering and chemistry
the beer brewers employ.
 
originally posted by mark e:
originally posted by Marc D:

It looks like the wine industry has adopted engineering and chemistry . . .
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Yeah, that happened - in ernest - about 50 years ago.
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I’m always a little behind.
But seriously thanks to you and everyone else for continuing to help find the vigneron artists.
 
I really appreciate this conversation, seriously. I don't think I was tracking on this in this way. Eric your comments are helpful.

I guess I want to challenge, a bit - are we sure that this style of winemaking is always associated with heavy manipulation and chemistry?

I wonder what Anita would say if she were on this thread. She might not appreciate it. Could this style simply be the result of a very clean approach, small barrel raising (which she employs), etc.?
 
I apologize for being the pestiferous one, Eric, but that list of horribles does not tell me specifically what the Northern Rhone is doing differently these days to make what I take you to be saying are correct, well-made, but soul-less wines. I am not disagreeing with you. I really just want to know.
 
originally posted by BJ:
small barrel raising
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Small barrel ageing. "Raising" is what you do with children - and where wine is concerned a literal translation from French.
 
originally posted by Marc D:
originally posted by mark e:
originally posted by Marc D:

It looks like the wine industry has adopted engineering and chemistry . . .
Click to expand...
Yeah, that happened - in ernest - about 50 years ago.
Click to expand...
I’m always a little behind.
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Not a problem. To put it in context: RO for desalination goes back to 1959. Large scale use of it in wine happened thanks to one of my UCD roommates, Barry Gnekow, who was studying biochemistry in the early 70s and went on to found Ariel.
 
originally posted by BJ:
I feel the beginnings of an important discussion.

I hate spoofed northern Rhone. Just look at what happened to Jamet, Chave.

FWIW Anita is not new oaked as far as I can tell.

There is a different sort of new clean wine out there, quite pure, direct. No stinky baba cool, no new oak/maquillage, not industrial, not traditional either. Anita seems like a good representation of this. Perhaps Germain is as well.

I sense a shift underway and don't quite know what to think.
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likely that you may know this, but jamet split now several years ago, and now there is the good jamet (jean paul, corinne & loic--same as it ever was) and the bad jamet (jean-luc).

and yes, chave has gone to fruit-bomb hell.

for hermitage, go to bermard faurie.
 
We visited Jamet in 2000. Dirt floor cellar, mud everywhere outside, dogs with matted hair running wild. We took one sip of the '98 and were completely floored. Still one of those lifetime wines. Somehow managed to avoid funk flaws.

We stayed for a week in Condrieu in around '08 and walked over to the domaine, excited for a reprise. Gone with the old shacks, in with cheesy new tidy domaine.

I don't agree with you about the new JP Jamet...I haven't had a lot, but what I've had I didn't care for, not the same.
 
Interesting read. I'm passing through Lyon this summer and had planned to visit Cote Rotie with a friend. I don't keep up with the wines, but figured there would be something of interest. You folks are making me reconsider!
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
Interesting read. I'm passing through Lyon this summer and had planned to visit Cote Rotie with a friend. I don't keep up with the wines, but figured there would be something of interest. You folks are making me reconsider!
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Dunno how you're going to get appointments but go anyway. There are always a few people worth tasting (Levet, Jasmin, maybe) and a few worth gawking (Ogier vinifies each parcel separately and on a good day you can try them, an education in the dirt even if blurred by shiny-glossy winemaking). Gangloff, maybe, he was all the rage at the show.

Or skip Ampuis and go to Mauves and Tournon.
 
Eric, I'm also curious...are you suggesting the Lafarge's Beaujolais wines are chemically manipulated? And that their wines are vinified and raised based on consultant recommendations?

Sorry if I'm seeming pointed, but I'm trying to sharpen the discussion.
 
originally posted by BJ:
I wonder what Anita would say if she were on this thread. She might not appreciate it. Could this style simply be the result of a very clean approach, small barrel raising (which she employs), etc.?
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She should be here.

As far as I can tell, she is meticulously following rules that could make the same nice, clean wine from anything you toss in the hopper.

The 100-point wine, she says, has tastes of roasted coffee and vanilla.
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:

Dunno how you're going to get appointments but go anyway. There are always a few people worth tasting (Levet, Jasmin, maybe) and a few worth gawking (Ogier vinifies each parcel separately and on a good day you can try them, an education in the dirt even if blurred by shiny-glossy winemaking). Gangloff, maybe, he was all the rage at the show..
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I went to Cote Rotie way back in 2004, and tasted at Jasmin, Jamet, Ogier and Monteillet. Gangloff does seem like a BIG DEAL!
 
originally posted by BJ:
originally posted by mark e:
originally posted by BJ:
small barrel raising
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Small barrel ageing. "Raising" is what you do with children - and where wine is concerned a literal translation from French.
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Seriously?
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Totally. The first time - ever - I heard this was on a trip to the Loire with Dressner. By that time I had worked in a number of wineries and visited dozens. Never, ever heard that. A French winemaker was speaking and Dressner was translating. He said something like "raised in steel." Thought it was funny, but completely understood where it was coming from given the French word "élevé."
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
originally posted by BJ:
I wonder what Anita would say if she were on this thread. She might not appreciate it. Could this style simply be the result of a very clean approach, small barrel raising (which she employs), etc.?
Click to expand...
She should be here.

As far as I can tell, she is meticulously following rules that could make the same nice, clean wine from anything you toss in the hopper.

The 100-point wine, she says, has tastes of roasted coffee and vanilla.
Click to expand...

I appreciate the conversation in the generalities but I question the specifics. I don't think we know enough about individual domaines to make pronouncements.

Anita is brought in by Rosenthal and Germain by KLWM. Are we thinking they are the vanguard of the new wine sellout?

Again, just pushing the conversation.
 
originally posted by BJ:
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
originally posted by BJ:
I wonder what Anita would say if she were on this thread. She might not appreciate it. Could this style simply be the result of a very clean approach, small barrel raising (which she employs), etc.?
Click to expand...
She should be here.

As far as I can tell, she is meticulously following rules that could make the same nice, clean wine from anything you toss in the hopper.

The 100-point wine, she says, has tastes of roasted coffee and vanilla.
Click to expand...

I appreciate the conversation in the generalities but I question the specifics. I don't think we know enough about individual domaines to make pronouncements.

Anita is brought in by Rosenthal and Germain by KLWM. Are we thinking they are the vanguard of the new wine sellout?

Again, just pushing the conversation.
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i doubt that either of these importers dictates the style of wine being made.

that is more of a north berkeley imports 'cuvee unique' sort of thing,
 
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